Job satisfaction been falling for 20 years

[Name Lips]

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/34691428/ns/business-careers/


Americans’ job satisfaction falls to record low
Economists warn discontent could stifle innovation, hurt U.S. productivity

WASHINGTON - We can't get no job satisfaction.

Even Americans who are lucky enough to have work in this economy are becoming more unhappy with their jobs, according to a new survey that found only 45 percent of Americans are satisfied with their work.

That was the lowest level ever recorded by the Conference Board research group in more than 22 years of studying the issue. In 2008, 49 percent of those surveyed reported satisfaction with their jobs.
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The drop in workers' happiness can be partly blamed on the worst recession since the 1930s, which made it difficult for some people to find challenging and suitable jobs. But worker dissatisfaction has been on the rise for more than two decades.

"It says something troubling about work in America. It is not about the business cycle or one grumpy generation," says Linda Barrington, managing director of human capital at the Conference Board, who helped write the report, which was released Tuesday.

Workers have grown steadily more unhappy for a variety of reasons:

* Fewer workers consider their jobs to be interesting.
* Incomes have not kept up with inflation.
* The soaring cost of health insurance has eaten into workers' take-home pay.

If the job satisfaction trend is not reversed, economists say, it could stifle innovation and hurt America's competitiveness and productivity. And it could make unhappy older workers less inclined to take the time to share their knowledge and skills with younger workers.

Nate Carrasco, 26, of Odessa, Texas, says he's been pretty unhappy in most of his jobs, including his current one at an auto parts store.

"There is no sense of teamwork in most places any more," Carrasco gripes.

When the Conference Board's first survey was conducted in 1987, most workers — 61 percent — said they were happy in their jobs. The survey of 5,000 households was conducted for the Conference Board by TNS, a global market research company.

One clue that may explain workers' growing dissatisfaction: Only 51 percent now find their jobs interesting — another low in the survey's 22 years. In 1987, nearly 70 percent said they were interested in their work.

Workers who find their jobs interesting are more likely to be innovative and to take the calculated risks and the initiative that drive productivity and contribute to economic growth, Barrington says.

"What's really disturbing about growing job dissatisfaction is the way it can play into the competitive nature of the U.S. work force down the road and on the growth of the U.S. economy — all in a negative way," says Lynn Franco, another author of the report and director of the Conference Board's Consumer Research Center.

Conference Board officials and outside economists suggested that weak wage growth helps explain why workers' unhappiness has been rising for more than 20 years. After growing in the 1980s and 1990s, average household incomes adjusted for inflation have been shrinking since 2000.

Also, compared with 1980, three times as many workers contribute to the cost of their health insurance — and those contributions have gone up. The average employee contribution for single-coverage medical care benefits rose from $48 a month to $76 a month between 1999 and 2006.

Workers under 25 expressed the highest level of dissatisfaction. Roughly 64 percent of workers under 25 say they were unhappy in their jobs. The recession has been especially hard on young workers, who face fewer opportunities now and lower wages, some analysts say.
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The most satisfied were those ages 25 to 34, who may see some opportunities for upward mobility as baby boomers retire. Around 47 percent of workers 25 to 34 say they were happy in their jobs.

Some other key findings of the survey:

* Forty-three percent of workers feel secure in their jobs. In 2008, 47 percent said they feel secure in their jobs, while 59 percent felt that way in 1987.
* Fifty-six percent say they like their co-workers, slightly less than the 57 percent who said so last year but down from 68 percent in 1987.
* Fifty-six percent say they are satisfied with their commute to work even as commute times have grown longer over the years. That compares with 54 percent in 2008 and 63 percent in 1987.
* Fifty-one percent say their are satisfied with their boss. That's down from 55 percent in 2008 and around 60 percent two decades ago.

Carrasco said he wishes his bosses would take time to listen to workers' ideas — and their difficulties on the job.

"Most of the time they only listen to what their bosses are saying," he says. "Bosses need to come down to the employee level more and see what actually goes on, versus what their paperwork tells them is happening in the stores."

It wouldn't be fair to blame low job satisfaction solely on bad bosses, Barrington says.

"It is two-way responsibility," she says. "Workers also have to figure out what they should be doing to be the most engaged in their jobs and the most productive."
Now this is interesting to me because I haven't even been IN the workforce for 20 years. But I do see an attitude that fits with this data... People see jobs that are fulfilling and interesting as "luxury" jobs, or "they wish they could do them" or "I'd be really lucky if I could get a job like that" or "I'd do what I love, but it doesn't pay enough." And so on. People are picking jobs because the pay, hours, location, benefits, and so on "match" the life they're trying to live. As opposed to finding the work they love to do, and creating a life that works around that job.

[Utrecht]

Honestly, I put this up more to more and more Americans becomming spoiled little princesess unable to suck it up rather than jobs being uninteresting. Lets be honest, working in a cannery or something similar has to suck more than just about any say, call center type job.

One caveat I would add though is that i could see people being unhappy if they cant see what their work leads to - but from a quality of life perspective we are waaaaaay better today than before.

[Pigs in Space]

I wonder if its because the cost of living has been increasing while minimum wage hasn't been, for that period.

I know I'm exactly the same percentage happier as my raise is big.

[Hatter]

Working from home has increased my job satisfaction immensely.

[cyphersmith]

Honestly, I put this up more to more and more Americans becomming spoiled little princesess unable to suck it up rather than jobs being uninteresting. Lets be honest, working in a cannery or something similar has to suck more than just about any say, call center type job.

One caveat I would add though is that i could see people being unhappy if they cant see what their work leads to - but from a quality of life perspective we are waaaaaay better today than before.

Having done both factory work and call center work, I would say you're wrong about that. Call center work is soul sucking. Sure, the factory work is physically demanding and boring, but at least you don't have people yelling at you day in and day out about something you can't help them with.

[TiQuinn]

I don't have much sympathy for folks who don't find their jobs interesting. They can and should find another job and possibly another career, in that case.

[Name Lips]

I don't have much sympathy for folks who don't find their jobs interesting. They can and should find another job and possibly another career, in that case.

Well, in all fairness, there are a lot of shitty jobs that are necessary for our society to function, and very few people who will find them interesting. So while that advice might work for lots of dissatisfied individuals, it's not really a solution to the larger problem.

What is that larger problem? I don't know. Maybe we're hitting on something with the "special snowflake" musings. The jobs aren't any worse, but we have more people out there who believe they're better than the work they can find.

Or perhaps we're shifting away from a work-defined mentality. It used to be that people would define themselves by their job, and work that job for the majority of their lives, taking pride in doing it as well as possible. Increasingly I see people who do not define themselves by what they do - they view the job as a necessary evil where 9 hours of their lives "vanish" every day. The remaining time is where their real lives take place. The job is simply dead time, meaningless to them. They will switch in a heartbeat to a place that offers more money, or is closer to home, or whatever. But it doesn't occur to anybody to sacrifice the "off-work" time - by for example having less money with which to enjoy it - in order to have good, fulfilling "at-work" time.

Spoilered because I was getting kind of meta and projecting my own life into this problem, which doesn't really necessarily relate to the article, and risks hijacking the thread with a "hey look at MEEEEE!" post.

Or maybe I'm projecting my own experiences to the problem. I was working job-to-job because I needed to, with absolutely no enjoyment or pride in what I was doing. It was dead time that as far as I was concerned contributed nothing to my life, but was simply necessary. Like shitting. I tried several things out of convenience or necessity, but not out of desire. Changing this - putting fulfilling work into its place as a priority - required a complete re-structuring of our lives. Emerald and I came at this realization together and decided we weren't going to stand for it anymore. She got her teaching credentials and is now happier than I've ever seen her, doing what she loves. And I'm going back to school for what I should have done in the first place - working with computers (specifically programming, but I'm taking so many other computer courses I'll be pretty well-rounded by the end of it). We're finally both happy with what we're doing, with our direction in life. And I think that sets a better example for our kids than the more common "two working parents who complain about their shitty jobs, but at least we have money for cool stuff" model of life.

So yeah, we're poor. We could prioritize money and not be poor, but why bother? We're working towards being the people we want to be, and we're largely living within our means, and our kids are happy and healthy and doing well in school. What more could we really ask for?

[Schizm]

My job blows goats for quarters. We can't trust management not to fuck us over at any given opportunity, our customers are insane assholes who are too stupid to be expected to have the ability to follow directions like 'type www.google.com' in the address bar of a browser, because they don't even know what an address bar is in a browser, much less how to type, and our sales force is as bent and crooked as it takes to be to sell a blackberry to a 81 year old granny.... And we've got the best customer satisfaction ratings (on one or two metrics, maybe) of the big wireless carriers. And the pay is fucking amazing for the area.

The job is neither interesting nor fulfilling, and the shit that I put up with day in and out is as nasty as it gets. The sad fact of life is that the nastier a job is, the more someone is willing to pay to have it done - and when wages outpace the cost of living, that means the only jobs that keep up with cost of living are the shitty ones.

queue at least one person saying: you have a choice (blahblahblah) now, because they've never actually lived below the poverty line. guess what? the work is still shitty, boring, and soul-sucking, but at least I can afford food.

[Space Cadet B^3]

My job's okay, but I'm underutilized, I keep my eyes open for a different position, perhaps one without daily press deadlines.

[bunny]

Honestly, I put this up more to more and more Americans becomming spoiled little princesess unable to suck it up rather than jobs being uninteresting. Lets be honest, working in a cannery or something similar has to suck more than just about any say, call center type job.

I support what you are saying to a point. The market crash has led to a lot of people on the verge of retirement staying with their jobs or re-entering the workforce. The projection while I was in high school and university was that the baby boomers would retire and this would open a lot of positions in certain fields.

If I had taken an education course in the hopes of becoming a teacher, I'd be SOL now. I'd have to find a way to make money in the mean time and given how the current market is in this city that could mean anything from janitorial to waiting tables. While some hotels pay their housekeepers more than most secretarial positions in this city (from what I've been seeing online, secretaries usually are offered 10-13 an hour to start, while high end hotels offer 16-18), it's not very satisfying to have spent so much time and money training to be a teacher only to end up scrubbing toilets.

The number of should be retirees holding onto their jobs also causes negative effects on the workplace. My boyfriend's mum works at the university, and she says that so many people are refusing to retire because their savings were wiped out and they come in every day resenting the fact that they still have to work. She finds it disheartening because there are so many young people who could bring a vibrant new energy and innovation to the staff. At the university, this not only effects the fellow staff members, but the end results on the education the students are getting.

[Ancalagon]

I don't have much sympathy for folks who don't find their jobs interesting. They can and should find another job and possibly another career, in that case.

Studies have shown that 90% of high school kids want 10% of the jobs... no one wants to be a used-car salesman or a janitor but ...

[Xavier Lang]

I like my job. I enjoy what I do. I enjoy my coworkers and have fun interacting with them. I also enjoy a good day of plenty to do and heads down working. I'm one of the lucky ones. I miss working with Varaj and the gang, but the pay is better where I am now and they did lay me off. :)

[Pigs in Space]

I enjoy what I do a lot. Opportunites abound for me to get involved in interesting things etc.

However, I'm at that career point where there are lots of people wanting me to do lots of things, and I have stuff with deadlines on top of that. Stresses me out.

[Janos]

I enjoy what I do a lot. Opportunites abound for me to get involved in interesting things etc.

However, I'm at that career point where there are lots of people wanting me to do lots of things, and I have stuff with deadlines on top of that. Stresses me out.

That's pretty much where I am.

I got here by making compromises early in my career/education to find the right balance between pay and what I wanted to do. It took soul searching, but I found a combination I can live with, and made sure that I grew to love all of it as time went on.

I'm not sure a lot of people do that last part. Whether it's entitlement or not, most people I know hate their job more as time goes on, rather than accepting it and focusing on the good parts. It's like the analogy of marriages that gets thrown around a lot. In the old days, people made the most of their marriages, and made them work through effort. These days with a marriage, if it isn't perfect they abandon it rather than work on it.

[Brynja]

I found retooling my spending had made me much happier. I dont miss what i "lost"I have more peace and security and I love my job

[Lady_Acoma]

You know I live below the poverty line. Even if I got full time employment I would live below the poverty line I think, or at least be skirting it pretty closely.

But I love my job. It is incredibly rewarding even if it is stressful. So instead of just bitching I am working on creating more opportunities within my field of choice and finding ways to increase my marketable worth as an employee. I take pride in what I do and I find a lot of pride in pushing it forward to be more successful.

Honestly though I have always liked things like work and school and I realize that is different then most. It took a horrible situation for me to find a job that I could not tolerate and I hated to do. When I found it, I quit.

[Vermicious Knid]

My job blows goats for quarters. We can't trust management not to fuck us over at any given opportunity, our customers are insane assholes who are too stupid to be expected to have the ability to follow directions like 'type www.google.com' in the address bar of a browser, because they don't even know what an address bar is in a browser, much less how to type, and our sales force is as bent and crooked as it takes to be to sell a iPhone to a 81 year old granny.... And we've got the best customer satisfaction ratings (on one or two metrics, maybe) of the big consumer electronic companies. And the pay is fucking amazing for the area.

The job is neither interesting nor fulfilling, and the shit that I put up with day in and out is as nasty as it gets. The sad fact of life is that the nastier a job is, the more someone is willing to pay to have it done - and when wages outpace the cost of living, that means the only jobs that keep up with cost of living are the shitty ones.

queue at least one person saying: you have a choice (blahblahblah) now, because they've never actually lived below the poverty line. guess what? the work is still shitty, boring, and soul-sucking, but at least I can afford food.


Fixed for my job.

[Schizm]

Fixed for my job.

pretty much all truth. Customer service (of which technical support is a part) sucks. I'm just working on the promotions to get off the phones, and I will happily trade my ethics and morals for a bigger paycheck and less shitty job.

[tleilaxu]

Honestly, I put this up more to more and more Americans becomming spoiled little princesess unable to suck it up rather than jobs being uninteresting. Lets be honest, working in a cannery or something similar has to suck more than just about any say, call center type job.

i put it up to conditions actually being worse now. life for most people doesn't involve picking and choosing what your job is, it's constant desperation, or as they say on Good Times, "scratchin' and surviving"

One caveat I would add though is that i could see people being unhappy if they cant see what their work leads to - but from a quality of life perspective we are waaaaaay better today than before.

better than 20 or 30 years ago? i grew up in michigan, so my entire life has been like a slow motion atomic bomb going off, or like water slowly swirling down the drain.

the rich have gotten richer, wages for everyone else have stagnated, all the while benefits have been reduced and the bullshit increased.
and then i hear people talk about how great capitalism is and blah blah blah and it drives me crazy and i get emotional about it.

[Janos]

i put it up to conditions actually being worse now. life for most people doesn't involve picking and choosing what your job is, it's constant desperation, or as they say on Good Times, "scratchin' and surviving".

I'm confused by this. Job mobility has significantly increased, the variety of jobs available, the total number of jos available, and barriers (like gender, religion, and race) have to other jobs have significantly decreased in the past 20+ years. People have more choices and more access to a wider variety of jobs than ever before.

While relative wealth and pay have gone down, saying people don't have a choice, or implying they once had a choice and no longer do isn't really accurate.

[tleilaxu]

I'm confused by this. Job mobility has significantly increased, the variety of jobs available, the total number of jos available, and barriers (like gender, religion, and race) have to other jobs have significantly decreased in the past 20+ years. People have more choices and more access to a wider variety of jobs than ever before.

i'm not saying this from the pov of a bitter person: i'm achieving everything i want to achieve professionally. but i'd bet you dollars to donuts most people feel more hemmed in, feel like they have fewer options, feel more anxiety about their jobs, etc than they did in 1990. you say "people have more choices and more access to a wider variety of jobs than ever before". well sure, but a lot of that variety is choosing between picking blueberries or cherrys, or between working in the refridgerator factory or the lawnmotor factory, which is to say not really a choice at all.

While relative wealth and pay have gone down, saying people don't have a choice, or implying they once had a choice and no longer do isn't really accurate.

i'm not talking in binary terms like "people had a choice" and now "people don't have a choice". what i am saying is that most people live paycheck to paycheck, and a greater proportion of the population is living from paycheck to paycheck now than when i was a kid. people have been screwed by the fat cats and most people are (to quote futurama's nixon) 'too drunk or stupid' to even realize what has happened to them.

[Janos]

you say "people have more choices and more access to a wider variety of jobs than ever before". well sure, but a lot of that variety is choosing between picking blueberries or cherrys, or between working in the refridgerator factory or the lawnmotor factory, which is to say not really a choice at all.

That's just not true. You're forgetting all the jobs created by the technology boom of the past 20 years. IT jobs, HR jobs, Call Center jobs, Engineering jobs, jobs in Science, Chemicals, etc.

The only sector of the economy that has seen an overall decrease in variety and type of jobs is manufacturing. Agriculture has stayed consistent, and there has been a huge boom in service, administration, goverment, and research jobs.

People are currently going to school for jobs that haven't even been invented yet. The boom we're seeing right now in genetics, robotics, medical technology, etc is more theoretical than practical, but still represents an overall increase in the variety of jobs.

greater proportion of the population is living from paycheck to paycheck now than when i was a kid.

This part is true.

people have been screwed by the fat cats and most people are (to quote futurama's nixon) 'too drunk or stupid' to even realize what has happened to them.

This really isn't true. While relative wages have gone down, and costs have gone up somewhat, personal debt has increased significantly more than those factors. The average person spends a lot more money these days than they did in 1990, and that amount is in excess of the "fat cats keeping more of their money".

Quality of living and personal wealth have increased since the 1990ies. So has debt, primarily because people are more obssessed today with "stuff", but that's a culture shift, not something you can just pin on the rich. So they may be drunk and stupid, but the responsibility is with us as individuals and as a culture as anything else.

[tleilaxu]

my response got nuked. the pithy version:

a. IT jobs etc niche jobs, not basis for national economy as a whole.

b. keeping people in permanent state of debt is a tactic that goes back at least to the land enclosure movement in britain.

c. fall back to 'individual responsibility' a dodge. any social problem can be blown off and blamed on individual failings. who cares whose fault it is, i just see things sucking and want them to be better.

d. look at graph. middle part good, high tide rises all ships. right hand very very good for few people, bad for everyone else.

[Janos]

my response got nuked. the pithy version:

a. IT jobs etc niche jobs, not basis for national economy as a whole.

http://flare.prefuse.org/launch/apps/job_voyager

Notice how much smaller all catagories are? That means there more jobs falling into each catagory. Look at a lot of the specific industries that have seen major growth in 1990 to 2000. Dozens of catagories increased by a pecentage or more. What you're disregarding as "niche" is a lot larger than that. There's a full percent in increaes of professionals alone (Lawyers, Doctors, etc).

People are working "better" jobs today than they did 20 years ago. They're more mentally stimulating, easier on the body, etc. We've shifted from "blue" collar jobs to "white" collar jobs. There has been a decrease in retail jobs, manufacturing, farming, gardening, and most other menial jobs.

How is that picking cherries or blueberries?

c. fall back to 'individual responsibility' a dodge. any social problem can be blown off and blamed on individual failings. who cares whose fault it is, i just see things sucking and want them to be better.

So which is it? I accredited the change to both decreasing wages and personal responsibility and said that you can't pin it just on the rich. You disgrard personal responsibility, make several comments about government and big business holding people down, then go on say that the reason doesn't matter. But clearly it does to you. That looks to me like a pretty obvious one directional bias.

d. look at graph. middle part good, high tide rises all ships. right hand very very good for few people, bad for everyone else.

I see an overall increase. I see some people have a larger increase than others, but still a net increase for everyone. I fail to see how that is inherently bad.

[Name Lips]

Personal responsibility is a strange topic, deserving of its own thread. It's a great phrase because you can't be against it -- that would mean you're for personal irresponsibility! Nobody wants to be for irresponsibility.

I have no problem with personal responsibility being a prerequisite for success in life. As long as:

It is impossible to be successful without personal responsibility.
The system is set up so that if everybody is responsible, they can all be successful.

If these conditions are met, we can be assured that responsibility = success. Then we can look at the unsuccessful and know instantly that they are irresponsible.

But I don't see that being the system we have. I see a system where people can ride on the coattails of other, more successful people than themselves (especially through inheritance) and lead wealthy, successful lives despite their own irresponsible behaviors.

I also see a system where we are utterly dependent on a having a large mass of people working menial jobs and dying in poverty. These people aren't the "irresponsible" ones -- theirs is simply a role that must be filled, no matter how responsible they might be as individuals. It is possible for some of them to forge their way to the higher levels of "success" but impossible for all of them to do so, no matter how responsible they are or how hard they try. Without them filling their niches, society would completely collapse. They're the foundation upon which everything else is built.

And no I don't see any way to change it. Maybe that's what some of this dissatisfaction is all about - an increasing awareness that it's impossible for everybody to be successful. People are slowly coming to the realization that they can't all go to college and have good jobs. We have increasing numbers of people going to college and there being no jobs available for them -- those niches are all filled. You're still on the bottom, sorry!

In a way, it's a bad thing for the entire country to be well-informed and have access to higher education. We simply can't all have good jobs. And if we did all have good, high-paying, professional jobs we'd still need a foundation of unskilled masses to stand on -- we'd just have to use other nations or something, in effect outsourcing the entire lower class.

Maybe technology will free us from this cycle, with a robot working class or something. But I see nothing realistic on the horizon.

[tleilaxu]

What you're disregarding as "niche" is a lot larger than that. There's a full percent in increaes of professionals alone (Lawyers, Doctors, etc).

i'm not disregarding it. there is some truth to the points you've made. but consider the economy at a national level. you can't just have people selling burgers to one another or shuffling papers back and forth. doctors provide medical care, a service that keeps the population healthy so they can engage in productive work. value must be added in order to afford doctors and IT guys and geneticists and archaeologists.

People are working "better" jobs today than they did 20 years ago. They're more mentally stimulating, easier on the body, etc. We've shifted from "blue" collar jobs to "white" collar jobs. There has been a decrease in retail jobs, manufacturing, farming, gardening, and most other menial jobs.

i think you're speaking about a slice of the population and not the population as a whole. for working stiffs, i posit there's no difference. punch in punch out. the grind. most people work for food, not joy.

How is that picking cherries or blueberries?

for people living paycheck to paycheck IE on the edge employment is a Hobson's Choice. that's all i'm saying. people in general ain't so free as you or me.

So which is it? I accredited the change to both decreasing wages and personal responsibility and said that you can't pin it just on the rich.

all of the above. see below.

You disgrard personal responsibility, make several comments about government and big business holding people down, then go on say that the reason doesn't matter. But clearly it does to you. That looks to me like a pretty obvious one directional bias.

i don't disregard personal responsibility. it is one of the most important things to teach someone. but on the level of social policy, there isn't much you can do about personal responsibility. so i think focusing on it can lead one to a basically conservative position where social ills are laid at the feet of individual bad decisions, while the affects of history and culture are ignored or deemphasized. bad decisions will always be with us, i'm not trying to fight against them. let the priests and shrinks do their jobs. and as far as bias is concerned.... everyone has bias. i own mine. like everyone, i've seen things you have not, they have shaped the way i look at the world. i've never said 'government and big business hold people down'. Ever. i recognize the effects they have. i recognize how they structure the field we all play upon. i recognize that the rules are not fair. you may disagree; i may be wrong, but i don't think so.

I see an overall increase. I see some people have a larger increase than others, but still a net increase for everyone. I fail to see how that is inherently bad.

it is not inherently bad. when it plays out in the world it is often bad. even when it is mostly good, there are still bad aspects. for myself, if someone works hard they deserve more. but i still put the dietary needs of a child born from the most worthless woman in the country above the desires of the powerful for more power.

[tleilaxu]

Maybe technology will free us from this cycle, with a robot working class or something. But I see nothing realistic on the horizon.

well utopia is no place, but i think the europeans have a better balance between classes worked out than we do.

in general, there are great blue-collar things that the people doing 'menial' jobs could do, if we had different priorities. if we valued someone who made wood into furniture more than people who cook books it would be better for everyone, including the fat cat living on the hill.

[Pigs in Space]

well utopia is no place, but i think the europeans have a better balance between classes worked out than we do.
I think the Scandanavians have a good balance of this.

Massive taxes, but the state keeps everybody off the streets, and has wonderful services. The taxes are not so much though, that innovation and business is crushed. It's a good balance.

And those folks have the highest living standards on the planet (for everybody, not just the rich).

[Janos]

i think you're speaking about a slice of the population and not the population as a whole. for working stiffs, i posit there's no difference. punch in punch out. the grind. most people work for food, not joy.

Then how are you defining job satisfaction? Are you just equating it with financial gain?

Almost all the evidence points to the contrary, that the nature of work is a more important factor to job satisfaction than compensation. How rewarding and/or challenging jobs and job stability/career advancement are consistently higher factors.

i don't disregard personal responsibility. it is one of the most important things to teach someone. but on the level of social policy, there isn't much you can do about personal responsibility. so i think focusing on it can lead one to a basically conservative position where social ills are laid at the feet of individual bad decisions, while the affects of history and culture are ignored or deemphasized.

I don't believe we're as powerless on a social level as you state. I think that financial education and a shift in cultural values can/does address personal responsibility. Even ignoring macro-Amerian culture at large, Asian American culture propels people toward success, even as African American culture can stifle them. If cultural factors can hold people back, why can't they push them forward as well? Why act as if we're powerless to address those factors?

i've never said 'government and big business hold people down'. Ever.

b. keeping people in permanent state of debt is a tactic that goes back at least to the land enclosure movement in britain.

Then what does that bullet point have to do with the conversation at hand?

i recognize how they structure the field we all play upon. i recognize that the rules are not fair. you may disagree; i may be wrong, but i don't think so.

I never said I thought the rules were fair. But I also believe we have a lot more ability to move within the rules and even break out of the rules paradigm. I don't believe that we're helpless victims of the system.

[Janos]

Maybe that's what some of this dissatisfaction is all about - an increasing awareness that it's impossible for everybody to be successful. People are slowly coming to the realization that they can't all go to college and have good jobs. We have increasing numbers of people going to college and there being no jobs available for them -- those niches are all filled. You're still on the bottom, sorry!

In a way, it's a bad thing for the entire country to be well-informed and have access to higher education. We simply can't all have good jobs. And if we did all have good, high-paying, professional jobs we'd still need a foundation of unskilled masses to stand on -- we'd just have to use other nations or something, in effect outsourcing the entire lower class.

I think there's an element of truth here, but I don't think the internet itself is directly the reason.

Going back to my marriage analogy though, I don't think this is the sum of the dissatisfaction either. Even before the advent of the internet, job satisfaction and marriage satisfaction rates were both decreasing. Mobility itself (virtual or otherwise) may be the factor though.

[tleilaxu]

Then how are you defining job satisfaction? Are you just equating it with financial gain?

Almost all the evidence points to the contrary, that the nature of work is a more important factor to job satisfaction than compensation. How rewarding and/or challenging jobs and job stability/career advancement are consistently higher factors.


well i'm not sure what the methodology of the people in the article posted used to come up with their 'reduction in job satisfaction conclusion' and i'm too lazy and preoccupied to find out. their conclusion makes sense to me. given your argument, wouldn't one expect job satisfaction to be higher?


I don't believe we're as powerless on a social level as you state.

this is all i claim: "Men make their own history, but they do not make it just as they please; they do not make it under circumstances chosen by themselves, but under circumstances directly found, given and transmuted from the past." -uncle karl

I think that financial education and a shift in cultural values can/does address personal responsibility. Even ignoring macro-Amerian culture at large, Asian American culture propels people toward success, even as African American culture can stifle them. If cultural factors can hold people back, why can't they push them forward as well? Why act as if we're powerless to address those factors?

right but what is the mandate, and what is the method for affecting such a change? as far as i know we have none, and we don't know one.


Then what does that bullet point have to do with the conversation at hand?

i believe that has to do with credit, several posts back.


I never said I thought the rules were fair. But I also believe we have a lot more ability to move within the rules and even break out of the rules paradigm. I don't believe that we're helpless victims of the system.

the goal for me is to be neither victim nor executioner. i don't believe people are helpless either. sigh